New Glenn’s Reuse Milestone Is Overshadowed by the Stage That Failed

AST SpaceMobile promised investors 45 satellites in orbit by year-end. After losing BlueBird 7 to a New Glenn upper stage failure in April, the company said it still expects one to two launches per month through the rest of 2026. The rocket that just failed its customer will likely be grounded for months pending an investigation. The math doesn’t work.

That arithmetic problem matters more than the reuse milestone Blue Origin earned on the same flight — and it earned a real one. The NG-3 mission’s first stage...